So Soft
by Remy's Writer
Summary: Just filler smut. Sweeney, Lovett and the fire. SweeneyLovett R


**Dear Readers,**

**This is a filler in apology to the absence of _The New Demon._ There will be another one of these. It will be entitled _Hard._ Watch for it.**

**Your Obedient Servant,  
R.W.**

**

* * *

**

_Soft_

**

* * *

**

**Disclaimer:**_ I own none of the characters. They belong to history, human imagination, Steven Sondheim and Time Burton.

* * *

_

The fire blazed.

The wood snapped and sent cinders burning through the air.

The smoke drafted up the chimney.

Toby slept soundly in the bedroom, his bottle of gin placed on the nightstand.

The door clicked shut with mechanical noise and a lace-covered hand caressed the doorknob carefully as its owner turned. Looking up, large brown eyes, drooping with exhaustion, met dark, haunted pits of endless black.

Clutching a hand to her chest, "Darlin'," she gasped, "Ya gave me a fright there. Wot are you doin' down here so late? Trouble sleeping? Let me get ya somethin' ta drink, yeh?"

"No." His voice was just as dark as his eyes. "I need to speak with you. Is the boy sleeping?"

Her brows drew in slightly. "Yes. Is… Is everythin' all right, love?"

"No, all is not well. And it never will be. You know that." He put his hands in his pockets and stared into the fire from the doorway where he stood.

"Wot is it ya needed to say, darling? At least get that off ya chest."

"I…" he began quietly. "Iloveyou." His voice was hushed, rushed.

"Wot, love?" she asked, tilting her head a bit towards him and taking a step forward.

"I said, I love you," only a bit louder this time.

"Listen, I can't hear ya, but if it's somethin' ya don't want to say but feel ya have to--"

"I _love_ you!" he all but roared.

Her large eyes got even larger as his words finally hit her ears. Love? How on earth…? He loves her? _'He loves me?'_

"Well… in all my years. Ya really have gone mad." She pushed away the concept of her affections being returned and used the excuse that the man was mad. As mad as the day he walked into her shop with the talk of murder.

"Damn you. I bloody love you! _You!_ Nellie Lovett! Don't you understand, woman?! I don't love. I _can't_ love but I love you." He caught his voice rising steadily and tried to quiet it for the sake of the boy in the next room. He didn't particularly like the lad, but his Lovett cared for the boy, so he tolerated his habit of hanging on her heels.

He examined the shock at his admission. It danced on her face like the flames in the fire. He took a few steps closer, as did she, and he watched her movements. They were near dream-like. He knew she held affection for him and that, with a secret such as this out to her, she would be happy to know she no longer had to hide it so much. All the years of brewing in that pit of a cell in Australia had him longing for his Lucy, his wife, his reason, and his life. It was with the realization that she was a far off dream never to come true that Sweeney steeled himself from society and opened his eyes. Upon first look into this new world he seemed to live in, he saw Mrs. Lovett. True, the only emotion he held towards her in the beginning was gratitude for providing a roof over his head, but he gradually noticed the way she spoke to him. He was finally able to really see how, even through the years that had changed him, she always secretly wished he would return to Fleet Street one day and be under his roof once more.

Every time she laid hand on his shoulder, he could feel the warmth of her life through the cloth of his shirts seep into his cold, unforgiving skin. He would watch as she tenderly washed the blood from his shirts late at night in the old sink, always looking into the distance, dreaming, no doubt, of the day that her affections should be returned. Though, she always thought that day to be a dream, never the shocking reality that smacked her in the face now.

"Say it again, for me?" she said in a small voice, looking up at him from five feet away, her voice wavering dangerously.

"I love you," he obliged quietly, but with certainty. He took a step closer, and she as well.

Three feet separating them.

"Again," she whispered loudly, her eyes growing larger every second.

He allowed the smallest of smiles to grace his sad features. "How many times must I humiliate myself with words, Mrs. Lovett? I love you." He took a step closer every time he said those three words and she stood still, dazed in front of the fireplace. "I love you now, and I loved you five bloody minutes ago." He was now in front of her, holding back the urge to touch her, feel her warmth, feel her _life._

"But, darlin', will you love me five minutes _from_ now? Five hours? How 'bout five days?" She looked up at him, searching, trying her damnedest to read his flat expression. She noticed the touch of smile widen. It was more of a smirk, really, but it mattered little to her.

"Yes, Mrs. Lovett. Yes, Mrs. Lovett. Yes all around," his deep voice was a harsh whisper actually filled with real emotion. Emotion other than anger, hate, revenge, or despair. It was an emotion so strange to come from him, poor Mrs. Lovett failed to think of a name for it. All she knew was that she liked it and it made her feel new again.

He murdered the space between them brutally, not wanting to hold back any longer. His palms, cold and hard, found her cheeks and held her face. The warmth he'd been craving for so long began to course through him, starting with his fingertips. He stepped as close as possible and hesitantly leaned forward. Nervously, he licked his lips quickly before setting his cold and thin lips on hers.

The warmth continued.

Now his hands felt real, sensitive to touch. Feeling spread outward from his lips at just this slight touch. He felt the tip of his nose twitch with life and this ever-moving warmth.

Lovett was shocked by the initial feel of his hands upon her face, the coolness making her muscles twitch in drastic temperature change. She did the first thing that came to mind and closed her eyes, reveling in the physical contact, reaching out with her mind to warm his forgotten flesh. His lips sent a shiver down her spine in the most wicked of ways. They were thin and twitching with nerves. He was hesitant and she could feel it in the way he held himself against her. The tips of their shoe-encased toes touched, her corseted chest brushed his, their lips connected.

His grip on her face changed as he gathered bravery. One hand slid slowly to the back of her neck and his fingers tangled in her loose hair, the up-do falling with the tiring of the day. His other hand cautiously found its way to the perfect curve of her waist, the corset cinching it stiffly. With a slight tug, like a silent plea, he brought her forward, pressing their bodies together. He allowed his lips to move slightly and he found hers moving beneath his. This was her saying it was alright, this was the validation he needed to show affection softly, without hurt or violence, for once in his life since Lucy.

Mrs. Lovett's arms wrapped tightly around her barber, still trying to wrap her mind around the concept of all of this truly happening. This was no dream. For once, she would not open her eyes to find her wildest, happiest dream to dissipate throughout the day into the corners of her mind. She let herself become lost in warming this man to his core, in kissing him, in being in this moment. Her lips moved faster and all he did was keep in time perfectly. When she ran her tongue along the seam of his lips, she felt him give the slightest of smiles as he opened his mouth to permit her entrance. Elated with her invitation, she pressed on the small of his back, pushing him as close to her as possible.

Frantically, she searched his mouth like a lost woman searching for her sanity. No crevice went un-traveled. She felt the poorly done fillings in the backs of his teeth, the ridges of the roof of his mouth and every bud on his tongue as they played cat and mouse through each other's mouths. Hungrily, she opened her mouth wider and he groaned quietly. Happy thoughts coursing through her blood and fantasies dancing behind her eyelids, she devoured his mouth as the customers ate up her pies.

Hands wandered and touched, feeling the way fabric molded to the human form in such intimate and secretly flattering ways.

Feet shuffled until the soft backs of knees found the edge of the small sofa and folded willingly, greedily.

Laces unlaced, ties untied, buttons unbuttoned.

Materials fluttered to the floor soundlessly in a frantic overtaking of minds, spirits, and bodies. Nothing but passion and here-and-now mindsets ticked away in the heads of a baker and a barber.

Small sounds escaped delicate throats and long, thin fingers caressed silky, pale skin. Skin that burned dangerously orange in the firelight, intimidating the fires of suppressed human nature and affection. Deep, strained noises squeezed from thick, corded muscle while small, butter-soft hands rubbed and teased hard, cold skin. Skin coming to life, after years of confinement and torture, at the touch of a single, small woman.

Sensations previously thought to be dead within the couple sparked to life as she lay beneath him, aching for things to finish, yet praying it would never stop. He was in pain, physical pain, at the emotion he found pumping through his blood as he gently lifted one of her legs to hook around his waist. A certain sense of fulfillment completed the odd experience for both as slowly, mockingly; he pushed himself to a place that finished her job. All this time she had been warming him with touches, words, strokes, inch by inch he'd felt the effects. Now, now that he was inside of her body her warmth flooded through him.

With a renewed sense of youth, the couple took their time in coupling, long unhurried strokes driving them closer to the edge of insanity. Both wanted to pound, beat and hammer their way to a satisfying end, yet neither was willing to give up the current sensation of becoming one being with someone truly cared for.

Short moments passed before her other leg curled to join the first wrapped tightly about his waist. Urging him slightly faster with a curt squeeze of her thighs, he shortened his strokes by very little, instead pushing a little harder. This drew muffled sounds from the woman beneath him, her face buried in his shoulder as her brows knit tightly together, her breathing coming in shorter gasps. He could feel her body trying to fight off the end of their splendor, clenching tighter with every movement he made inside of her.

He, too, felt the sensation long forgotten as his mind narrowed to the white heat pooling in his abdomen and the precious thing moving under him. She tried to pick up the pace, but he moved to hold her hips down, pinning them to the sofa cushions so she could not ruin the tenderness they'd created.

They looked into each other's eyes and saw it: realization. This was real, this would not go away, and they would not ignore it. There was a wall that blocked off those possibilities in the future and they were in no hurry to break them down.

Inner walls wound tighter, white heat turned blinding. Her nails found his back and scratched deep lines all the way down as their worlds came crashing down around them in a canopy of awareness. They held onto each other as wave after wave of painful pleasure crashed into them, drowning their senses.

The shoreline receded and vision returned slowly and sanity returned home to the minds of the truly mad who now lay, motionless, on the small, floral sofa.

"Nellie," he whispered into her hair. "My sweet, subservient Nellie." A kiss was placed on the shell of her ear. "Never leave my side."

Eyes closed, she smiled to herself. "Not so long as you provide me business, love." She kissed his collarbone sweetly, a barely-there touch. "I'm here, never will I let you die again. For if you do, I'm right there beside you."

Breathing evened and chests heaved alternately in time with one another.

The fire burned slowly low.

The wood cracked and blackened, sending dying embers to the air and dusting in the bottom of the brick.

A couple lay still as night in the afterglow of a consummated and long-denied irresistibility.

A barber and his baker; the perfectly ironic couple of the century.

* * *

_A/N: There you are. Now tell me if you want more. If you want it..._**Hard.**


End file.
